


hey, dorothea

by mauxre



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Best Friends, F/M, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Pining, Possibly Unrequited Love, Post-High School, Reader-Insert, Reminiscing, lots of longing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-26
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-18 21:47:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28999251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mauxre/pseuds/mauxre
Summary: “and if you're ever tired of bеing known for who you know, you know you'll always know me.”— in which four boys look back on the time they knew you, and ponder on the time they knew of you.
Relationships: Hanamaki Takahiro/Iwaizumi Hajime/Matsukawa Issei/Oikawa Tooru/Reader, Hanamaki Takahiro/Reader, Iwaizumi Hajime/Reader, Matsukawa Issei/Reader, Oikawa Tooru/Reader
Comments: 2
Kudos: 19





	1. matsukawa issei / the only place i see you now

**Author's Note:**

> listen to: **dorothea** by taylor swift
> 
> a seijoh third years mini-series! i've always wanted to write one :3 basically, each chapter can be read as standalones but they all belong in the same universe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "when we were younger down in the park, honey, making a lark of the misery.  
> you got shiny friends since you left town, a tiny screen's the only place i see you now,  
> and i got nothing but well wishes for ya."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alt. title: **the boy who shared his tree**

The tiny six-inch screen of his phone couldn’t even hope to do your face justice.

You looked magical, as always, and a few wistful years may have passed since he last saw you in person, your poise and grace — loud and clear from the other side of a mere digital screen — still exuded that familiar, calm energy that easily made you the most beautiful girl Matsukawa Issei had ever seen.

Your smile was a lot more reserved yet more defined, your posture much more proper yet more at ease, and your overall demeanor radiated quiet beauty yet loud confidence.

You looked familiar, yet you weren’t. You felt different now, yet the same, still.

Different in that you were much more put together than before, yet still the same in that your eyes still held that twinkle of mischief he noticed since the first day he met you.

You were a force to be reckoned with; and with your wide-eyed seven year old gaze fixated on an equally young Matsukawa, he found himself unconsciously scooting over and offering you a spot to sit beside him under the shade of the tree.

He liked to think he wasn’t exactly a petty and selfish child. But that pretty, shady, willow tree in the neighborhood park was _his_.

All the kids in town knew that, but unfortunately for him when he turned seven years old, you and your glaringly pink bento box came along, and shattered his shaky sense of childish ownership.

_Can I sit with you?_ You shyly came up to him, bento box in hand, knees all patched with equally pink bandages, looking up at him with adorably hopeful eyes.

He wanted to tell you that _this was his spot,_ and _nobody else can sit here_. He shouldn’t have a problem telling you that, especially when he smugly said those exact same words to the other scrawny kids in the neighborhood who came up to him so many times before.

But at seven years old, Matsukawa Issei learned that things weren’t always gonna go his way, especially when a certain hopeful-eyed, pink-obsessed girl was involved.

_Sure_ , he found himself answering you, even going as far as to shrug off the jacket he was wearing and laying it on the spot beside him for you to sit on.

You grinned toothily at him back then, two front teeth adorably missing, plopping down beside him and offering him a hefty portion of your rolled omelette in thanks. He couldn’t help but smile at you in return, easily ignoring the gaping looks of the other kids looking on from around the area at the sight of _the_ Matsukawa Issei — self-proclaimed sole owner of the ancient tree in the corner of the neighborhood park — actually _sharing_ his willow.

But as he occasionally looked back on that exact moment every couple of years down the line, he figured they got it all wrong.

Because that moment, with your toothy grin and his own dazzled gaze, was the moment that _that_ willow tree stopped being a safe haven for him alone, and became a sanctuary for both of you.

And over the years, _sanctuary_ usually meant something different.

In middle school — when the both of you were still young, naive, and only slightly snotty-faced — it meant a place where you could munch on some greasy junk food and complain about the week’s truckload of homework.

In high school — when your little two-person friendship branched out to include Hanamaki, Oikawa, and Iwaizumi — it meant a place where the five of you could devour a load of milk bread and chat about the volleyball team’s latest antics.

After graduation — when all of you were already scrambling to catch up with the impending expectations that came along with adulthood — it meant a place where all of you could share cheap convenience store alcohol and snicker over each other’s recent gimmick involving university or job applications.

Now that all of you were in your late twenties and were off on different paths — with Mattsun, in particular, enjoying minimum wage in a funeral parlor, no less, and with you reaching all sorts of heights across the globe — it meant something much more different... something more separate.

Now, _sanctuary_ meant a place for Matsukawa to sit down, all snug and cozy under the willow’s shade, at five o’clock in the afternoon by himself, watching professionally-crafted videos of you from the tiny screen of his phone, patiently waiting for your call.

Some days, you called. Some days, you didn’t. He didn’t mind, though; perfectly content to just sit under the tree, with his memories of you fondly keeping him company.

He never held it against you if you weren’t able to call. After all, he knew all too well how your trademark friendliness had only increased tenfold ever since you left town. You probably had hordes of friends just begging for your attention. Who was he to hog up all your time?

Still, he waited. He didn’t mind the wait, not when he had a bunch of your films and interviews downloaded in his phone. Time curiously flew by fast when he was watching you in your element, and by the time he was trying too hard to contain his awe and pride, your texts usually came.

_Just wrapped up! Give me five minutes._ Those were good days. Ones Matsukawa would never take for granted, not when he finally got to see your face, albeit from the other side of a digital screen, after painfully slow years of not physically seeing you.

The _real_ you. Not the _you_ that the world sees. Just… _you_.

_Can’t make it today, I’m so sorry. Make it up to you next time?_ Not-so-good days. Ones Matsukawa would rather brush off, typing out a meager ‘no worries’ while gently rubbing his sore bum after sitting for hours on end. The park would be as good as empty by then.

Empty and _quiet_. Not the kind of quiet that gave a sense of peace. Just… _quiet_.

The quietness was always unsettling. Or maybe that was just the weird tugging at his heartstrings. Whatever it was, it definitely gave him a strange unnerving feeling and a weird sense of unfair nostalgia.

He never had to make such an effort to talk to you before… Just walk a few blocks, maybe, over to your house or to the park or to school, and you were always there with open ears. But, now, he could count on one hand the number of times he managed to snag away a few minutes of your time in the past month or so. It was unsettling, to say the least.

Since when was your friendship reduced to mere video calls once a month, and twice at most? Were you always fated to be so far out of his reach? Was this really all there was to it?

No. There _had_ to be more than this.

Sometimes, in rare bouts of selfishness, Matsukawa wished you were never scouted, never discovered. Then maybe you would have never moved away and left them, left _him._ You would have never become such a household name. You would have never fallen in love with the city. You would have stayed.

Sometimes, in a fit of greediness and childishness, he wished Makki had never helped you out in reaching for your dreams. Then maybe you would be by his side right now, head on his shoulder as the two of you sat under the willow tree and scoffed at your minimum wage jobs, instead of you being thousands of miles away at some hotshot red carpet event that paid you a year’s worth of his meager salary.

Sometimes, he just wanted to keep you all to himself. Sometimes, he just wanted you back.

But he couldn’t. And he wouldn’t dare dwell on it because what good will it do to clip your wings if it would only hold you back? What good will it do to have you by his side if you would only end up feeling unfulfilled?

He could never do that to you. So instead of wallowing in his own self-inflicted misery, instead of chasing after something _more_ with you, he would settle on waiting. He was good with waiting.

He waited years only to finally become a starter at Seijoh in his third and final year. He waited years only to finally be hired at a job in a measly funeral company. Surely, he could wait just as patiently for you to come home — to run after your dreams, reach your fullest potential, and discover all there is to the world, before coming back to him.

He could, and he would, because he didn’t have a choice.

  
He could do nothing but wait. And surely, under _your_ willow tree, he would.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! makki's is up next :)


	2. hanamaki takahiro / the stars in your eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "ooh, this place is the same as it ever was, ooh, but you won't like it that way.  
> it's never too late to come back to my side, the stars in your eyes shined brighter in tupelo."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> alt. title: **the boy who saw your dreams**

Hanamaki Takahiro liked to believe he wasn't a selfish person.

His family, his friends, even complete strangers could attest to his easygoing personality — how laid back he was about things that seemed trivial, how he held the perfect balance between work and relaxation, how at ease he was with life and the world in general. After all, why should he sweat the small stuff when there was an infinitely bigger picture out there?

But the world was funny sometimes because it harshly gave him a seemingly inconsequential event that forced him to reassess not one, but two of his life's perspectives.

First, and probably the one that didn't change anything much, was that the world really was huge and there definitely was a bigger picture out there — but that didn't mean it was far out of reach.

If the cards were played right, the world could very well be at the tips of one’s fingers — even for small town folks like you and him. Luckily for you, the deck of cards had always been in your favor.

Helping you get scouted back in high school was a no brainer. After all, out of all of the guys in your little friend group, Makki was the one who was almost always available since Oikawa had extra practice, Iwaizumi had extra classes, and Matsukawa had younger siblings to go home early to.

That was how you found yourself taking constant refuge in his home, with his parents preparing dinner, his older sister out for work, the two of you surrounded by intimidating audition flyers all sprawled out on the living room table as his younger sister excitedly hovered over both of you. Back then, you both would talk and laugh over your recent audition attempts and snicker over how you claimed you messed them all up.

But even back then, he didn’t believe, for one second, that you ever messed up at all.

You always talked about how you thought you wouldn’t make it. That while your classmates and peers were all talking about seemingly more realistic career options in sciences and maths, you were wasting your time fussing over stupid auditions that probably wouldn’t lead to anything.

But they did, one fateful day in your third year. And things haven’t been the same ever since.

Second, and probably the most unexpected, was that he — Hanamaki Takahiro, resident chill guy and overall unproblematic person — was _selfish._

When you told him that one cloudy day in high school that you got a callback, Makki realized that he didn’t deserve to be your friend.

Because a good friend wouldn’t tense up at the sight of your excited face, waving your arms around ecstatically as you recounted to him the phone call you had with one of those talent scouts. Because a good friend wouldn’t have all these traitorous thoughts about how you shouldn’t accept the offer, how you should call up the talent scout and respectfully decline because you’d rather stay in Miyagi. Because a good friend wouldn’t feel _anything else_ except genuine happiness for your dream coming to fruition.

He _was_ selfish. When they helped you pack your things after graduation, he felt selfish. When they all drove you to the airport, he felt selfish. When you called him up one day and told him all about how everything was going surprisingly well, he felt selfish.

Even now, as he and the rest of the guys — except for Oikawa who had to settle for a video call — met up to watch one of your televised performances, he felt completely and begrudgingly selfish.

_Will you guys watch the show tonight?_ You had contacted them earlier that day and never did it ever occur to them to say no to you.

When they first met you back when you were first years, with your scrunched up smile and crinkles in the corners of your eyes as Matsukawa introduced you as his childhood friend, he already knew you were way out of his league.

_Your hair’s really pretty,_ you had told him, reaching a hand up to run it through his pinkish hair in lieu of a regular handshake.

He hadn’t been sure if he found it rude or endearing, but he had shrugged it off instead and flashed you his signature peace sign. When you had turned to face Oikawa and Iwaizumi and finished with the necessary introductions, he hadn’t been surprised when you greeted them the same way, either.

Things had clicked into place since then and the five of you were inseparable. But even when you all spent almost every waking minute with each other, it didn’t distract Makki from the fact that you were _special_.

You had always been far, far out of his reach, even back when all five of you practically never left each other alone. What more now when he only ever saw you from the other side of a digital screen?

You looked the same yet, at the same time, you didn’t. Your eyes looked fulfilled yet, at the same time, they looked dimmer. You looked happy yet, at the same time, you looked to be longing for something. Whichever it was, it didn’t change the fact that he held on to these little snippets of you through the screen because they were the only times when he felt that you were still close.

_Promise me you won’t forget me,_ you had said to him at the airport, your words exuding confidence, only betrayed by the clear nervousness written in your eyes.

He had chuckled, poking your forehead as he turned you around and ushered you to the airport terminal. _Silly girl, how could I ever forget you?_

It was impossible to. Not when your face — now more mature and confident but still beautiful and still very much _you_ — was plastered everywhere. In the billboards, the television, the news, in the mall, in magazines. You were _everywhere_.

And that’s where his selfishness kicked in… because he didn’t want you to be everywhere.

He only wanted you here, by their side, by _his_ side, laughing around as you watched some other show that starred some other larger-than-life icon. He only wanted you close, he only wanted you near, because that would mean you were within reach.

But you being _here_ would mean that you never got scouted. You being here would mean that you never achieved your dreams. You being here with _them_ would mean that things were the same as it was back then. You being here with _him_ would mean that this place didn’t change one bit.

He knew you wouldn’t like it that way. And a big part of him would never let you settle for that.

So he swallowed it down, his selfishness. When the rest of the guys were all hollering and cheering for you when your part in the show came up, he stood up and cheered along for you. When the show ended and their voices were only slightly hoarse from all the screaming, he made sure he was the first one to text you with a heartfelt ‘congratulations’. And when they all went home once the night was nowhere near young anymore, he kept his hands in his pockets and wondered what you were doing now.

Were you asleep? Were you resting? Were you tired? Were you happy? Were you reading their messages? Were you thinking of them? Were you thinking of him?

He might never know the answer, but for the first time in admittedly a long time, he found that he didn’t mind anymore.

You were finally off doing your thing. You were finally off living your _dream_. He didn’t understand it, the same way you didn’t understand how he could settle for being “in between jobs” at this point in his life. He probably would never understand in the long run, either, but that was alright.

He would let you go for now and let you live your life the way you were always meant to be. And he would be here, waiting. If you ever decided that you weren’t cut out for the life you chose, he’d welcome you back to his side, no questions asked. And even if you decided you could do it, that you loved the limelight and you could live in it for the rest of your life, he won’t ask any questions, either.

The choice was yours, even if you didn’t know it. And in this tiny town where you first met, he would wait for you to make it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oikawa's is up next :3


End file.
